The problem is not Muslims; it’s white men

President Donald Trump has issued over 15 executive orders since taking the oath of office.

The most egregious of these was the Muslim ban, in which refugees, visitors, green-card holders and foreign allies of the American government from seven majority-Muslim countries were denied entry into the United States.

In all, over 100 refugees were detained and interrogated like common terrorists. Countless more were sent back without interrogation, and many more were told to stay in their home countries.

Images of young children, wheelchair-bound elderly and torn-apart families being paraded around as common terrorists in our airports were been splashed across our television screens.

Simply put, this executive order exposed the lowest and ugliest of American bigotry. Its racist foundation, perpetrated by white nationalist Steve Bannon, has stained the integrity of the United States and everything we hold dear.

The reason is just as expected: we have to protect the United States from violence and terrorism.

If that’s the case, then riddle me this: why does the ban target countries that have never killed American citizens but does not target counties that have — like Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt? After all, 15 of the 19 attackers from 9/11 hailed from Saudi Arabia. One of the San Bernardino shooters was from Pakistan.

Simply put, this order is red meat for the Trump base, and it’s devoid of any rationality or fact-based scrutiny.

The Cato Institute, a conservative-libertarian think tank, recently went over the numbers, and they are telling: zero Americans have been killed by Syrian refugees in a terrorist attack on U.S. soil, and an American has not been killed by a refugee from any country since the mid-1970s. The chances of an American citizen being killed by a refugee is one in 3.6 billion. You have a better chance of being struck by lightning than you do being killed by a refugee.

If President Trump and the right-wingers were serious about curbing violence and terrorism in the United States, they would be targeting white men and rogue police officers.

Nobody wants to talk about or acknowledge the radicalization of white men in American society. But, it is happening and at an alarming rate. White nationalists, using Reddit, Stormfront, Twitter and other social media outlets and blogs have unleashed an insidious cancer on American society. Research by the New America Foundation shows that right wing, white nationalist extremists have killed more people than Islamic jihadists since September 11.

When taking into consideration attacks on Sikhs, Jews, African-Americans and even the police that try to stop it, violent white rage rears its ugly head more so than Muslims.

Luckily, law enforcement have been able to curtail much of it before the carnage was really unleashed.

In December 2015, California William Celli, a Trump supporter, was arrested after a tip led police to discover he was stockpiling bombs and guns with the intent on targeting a Muslim community.

In April 2016, Oregon resident John Martin Roos, a Trump supporter,was arrested after it was discovered he too was stockpiling weapons with the intent of“cleansing our country of the Muslim disease.”

In October 2016, three Kansas City men, also Trump supporters, were arrested after authorities learned of their intention to blow up a local mosque the day after the presidential election.

In June 2015, Dylann Roof murdered nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina. He was radicalized on Stormfront, a white-nationalist website.

Within nine days of the election, the Southern Poverty Law Center, tasked with monitoring extremists and hate crimes in the United States, recorded over 700 hate crimes and instances of intimidation hurled at Muslims, African- Americans, Jews and LGBT from right-wing whites.

So, why is the conversation solely focused on Islam and people of Middle Eastern descent when white men are literally plotting mass bombings across the country? Why is President Trump’s counter-extremist program now only going to solely focus on Muslims and not all aspects of extremism in the United States?

Today, white nationalists like Richard Spencer, Milo Yiannopoulos and Steve Bannon are directing the conversation. They have the president’s ear, and that should scare everyone.

Here in the United States, we don’t have a Muslim problem. We have a white man problem.

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